


Ragnar

by blue_crow



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-13
Updated: 2013-04-13
Packaged: 2017-12-08 10:04:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/760115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blue_crow/pseuds/blue_crow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A two and a five deal with the aftermath of radiation contracted at Ragnar Anchorage.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ragnar

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry I couldn't work in everyone you wanted, but I got bitten by this and couldn't let it go. Thank you for prompting me to explore these characters and this aspect of the cylons.

 

Two, _after his death at Ragnar Anchorage_

 

Even as my body sends signals pleading for air, I resist, willing myself to remain submerged in the tank, as if coaxing myself back into unconsciousness, perhaps as far back as my fresh corpse. I wait until my more primal instincts force me up, my first breath a demand. I am still shaking, and as I wipe the preserving gel from my eyes, I realize that I am alone here. My brothers and sisters are too busy to comfort me.

I draw another long breath, this one an invitation, and switch on my projection. A blink, and I sit not in a low tank of fluid, but in a shallow rowboat on a river I remember from Aerilon. I grasp the edge, the old wood sun-warmed beneath my fingertips, and swing my feet over the side before wading to the riverbank. A robe hangs waiting for me in the tree branches, and as I dress, it is as if nothing has ever happened. I bask in the afternoon glow, the trickle of water over rocks, and know that my fears of not being able to download were baseless. I am here, safe, my mission complete. I've sown fear into the hearts of the humans.

And then there is a glowing metal girder protruding from the tree, a twisted branch that runs until it disappears into a peculiar gap in the sky.

I reach up to feel along the tree- the paper birch bark peeling slightly under my hand- until I touch the beam, sharp and bitter cold- and the projection falls away, as if I'd never seen it. Any warmth I'd been telling my body to feel is gone, and I wrap my robe around myself more tightly. Somehow the robe feels less real against my skin.

I try again with the projection, and it holds, though the beam persists, wobbling around the edges. My projection is simply a program running between my ocular input and my consciousness, and I know that the reeds and marsh grasses represent walls and the dirt paths between them the passageways, and that relevant objects get incorporated naturally so that I can interact with them. But now, as I look around, other objects- or pieces of them- make it through. A piece of a resurrection tank floats in the river like wreckage. A red, pulsing eye stares at me from thin air, as if judging my actions. I must be having trouble distinguishing between relevant and irrelevant objects.

Should I ask the Fours? They might know how to correct the problem. But what if they can't? What if not all of my programming made it through the radiation?

I can't shake the feeling that they'd rather box me for study than cure me.

 

 

 

Five, _after his abandonment at Ragnar Anchorage_

 

I can't make my projection hold still.

I was terrified of the radiation- more so than of being found out and executed. I know even now the marines that left me here are doubting whether they did the right thing- they're doubting the doctor, they're suspecting that he's the cylon and that I'm a human. The word will spread through the Fleet- that might be more dangerous than what I could have done from the Colonial One, even the Galactica. But this radiation-

I swallow hard, trying to regain my purchase. My projection was helping at first- the leather armchair besides the fire, the vast view of snow falling on Douglas-firs- the most comforting things I know were a distraction from my declining control over my faculties. But there are pieces of the Anchorage that I can't block out. My brother Two's dead body is draped over the bear rug. My programming doesn't seem to care that it isn't even in this room of the Anchorage.

I know that I am more rigid than many of my brothers. Two would have faith. Three would have questions. One would have answers.

I am shaking and my coffee spills onto my pants, soaking through the fabric, scalding at first and then damp and unpleasant. My projection won't recognize that the coffee was never real in the first place, and should be able to be removed from my legs without issue. It should be. But I can't make it go away.

Eventually I turn the whole projection off. The expanse of the Anchorage is better than the alternatives. If I could kill myself to leave this place now, I would.

This is the first time I've contemplated the advantages of being human.

 

 

 

Two, _some weeks later, on the Basestar_

 

I see him by the river. I know at once which one he is- maybe the rest of my brothers can't detect the unsteadiness in his hands, but I can. Besides, I'm not sure which one of the Fives would linger around the river, kneeling and trailing his fingers through the water, considering. I know because I have thought the same thing many times.

I know he is the one that they called Doral, but I know the Fives- he would reject the name. He doesn't consider himself a hero, not like Caprica Six- but he isn't a hero. He failed, just as I failed. We were killed by humans. We were tainted forever with our failure, and with the sick dread of radiation. He and I are more like each other than we are any of those who share our model numbers.

I approach him by the boat- the tank- the boat that I see has knotted black cables, like spines, mooring it into the river. He doesn't look up.

"Why did you come for me?" he asks.

"We had to know what happened on the Galactica," is the easiest answer I have, at first.

"There are so many of us left in the Fleet. What happened to me is inconsequential."

"What else should we have done?" I ask.

"Left me," blurts Five. "Maybe if I'd resurrected-"

"I resurrected."

"But you're-" Five stares into eyes, searching for something very specific, like he could read my programming if he only looks hard enough.

"Faulty," I admit. "I have… problems."

He's trembling, a shake that starts in his shoulders but only really shows in his hands. I at least can keep still. Perhaps he is more damaged.

After a long silence, he tries, "maybe if I hadn't-" but can't finish the thought.

"No," I insist, though I'm not sure why. "Its better that you're here. If you think a fresh body would be… better,"

"I do." His eyes are trained on mine for the slightest sign of permission.

Perhaps mercy is something that God gave us. I press my lips to his, threading my fingers through his hair, and he conforms to my body, eager for the touch and what it promises. He moans against my mouth as my fingers find the nape of his neck, and I almost don't have the willpower to snap his spine. His body sags against mine, and already a fresh body is surfacing in the tank. At first it looks as empty and lifeless as the corpse I lay down beside it.

The first sign of life in a body is a hint of color as the blood begins to move in the smallest veins. The blood awakens the muscles, and there's a particular tension that living muscles have that corpses don't. Then the pulse comes into full, and the surface of the tank trembles with each beat. Five has no reservations about sitting up the second he's really conscious, and gasps for his first breath.

He wipes his face with his hand, and then pulls me into another kiss, more demanding than the first.

 

 

 

Five, _not long after_

 

As we lay tangled together in the sheets, he offers me his hand, and I accept.

I knew he projected rivers, but this sallow marshland is somehow more beautiful than what I'd expected- more peaceful- except for the gaps in the sky, the arcs of light from the basestar's structure.

"Show me," he murmurs against my temple and I do, invoking my favorite space- the mountain lodge, the fur rug, the roaring fireplace. It isn't shaking anymore, but it too has errors- holes- a bedpost rising out of the floor, a brilliant blue square in the middle of the window.

But I drop the image. I think, for once, that I'd rather just be where I am- enjoying what it must be like to be human.  



End file.
